


Leo Tsukinaga and Shu Itsuki do It for the Art

by apolinaria



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Kissing, M/M, Non-Explicit, during ! timeline, implied blowjob
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-04
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:26:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26802868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apolinaria/pseuds/apolinaria
Summary: Shu scoffed.“Liebestod literally means love death, don’t you know?  In the context of the opera, it’s Isolde’s last breath of  absolute heartbreak while holding her lover's dead body, and the music goes on to tease again and again a buildup for the beginning of a revelation of absolute sublimity, until she transcends beautifully as she passes away in grief and love. To reduce Wagner's work to something as base as- ““Well, the melody is still about sex.”“NOW, LISTEN, YOU LITTLE- “--------Shu and Leo's discussion of Wagner takes unexpected turns
Relationships: Itsuki Shuu/Tsukinaga Leo, unresolved Itsuki Shuu/Nito Nazuna, unresolved Sena Izumi/Tsukinaga Leo
Comments: 13
Kudos: 48





	Leo Tsukinaga and Shu Itsuki do It for the Art

**Author's Note:**

> Hi i wrote this bc of a joke my friend made (p much the title of this) and i was like hummmmmm *thinks deeply about this

“Tsukinaga, remind me again, why are you here?”

Through the noises of his sewing machine, he saw Tsukinaga on the floor, surrounded by the usual papers, who turned his head and smiled at the question.

“Well I don’t feel like going ho~ome and just want to write some more. One should follow their gut as an artist- You'd also say something like that, wouldn't you?”

“It’s 11 pm.”

“Bahh!!! Don't go and nag me, you are here too, and likely to sleep out of exhaustion in your table. “

Shu sighed in contempt.

“In any case, I also meant why are you _here_ , rather than anywhere else in this forsaken lousy school.”

“The costume you are sewing is looking pretty and it's nice seeing you sew, y’ know. Just the sound of your machine might fill me with inspiration that could last all night! And Shu's face; Shu's face makes some funny expressions while sewing its very in-te-res-ting ~"

“…Very well. Feel very lucky I haven’t kicked you out yet. Now do me a favor if you please and shut up so I can concentrate properly.”

He stopped the machine to manually sew in some sequins.

“Don’t be like Sena, you can be honest and say my company is nice, huh? We are not friends, we are not _friends,_ I know, but even rivals can inspire each other, right? Hey Shu, it’s been some time since we really talked, hasn’t it? ….Also- "He scratched his ear. “I was going to stay at the archery field, but there was a couple having sex there. “

Shu made a noise like he spit his drink regardless of him not drinking anything.

“Wahahaha, Shu is that shocked?”

“Are you going to just let those filthy, disgusting IMBECILES soil the ground of your club like that?!” He covered Mademoiselle's ears, and set her in a way she wouldn’t even be able to _see_ the conversation“If I even as much heard something that unsightly happened in here, I'd get whoever did it and have them clean every spot of the floor until it's shining brightly again."

Tsukinaga suddenly looked deep in thought. Shu didn’t quite expect that kind of expression.

“So Shu really thinks sex is that gross, huh? I mean- I hate it when people take some things I say to mean sexual stuff- Like, when I talk about love and all, but the way you say it, it's as if sex was some super sickening thing.”

And he tried really hard to keep concentrating in putting the thread inside the needle.

“Hmph. It is most definitely not a pure or clean thing.”

“I mean, aren’t you a Wagner fan?”

“That’s a bold assumption to make, Tsukinaga.”

“Your unit’s name is Valkyrie.”

“Which actually didn’t come from a Wagner reference on my part. And Wagner didn’t invent valkyries. But yes, I am rather fond of Wagner's music.”

“Ah, see!~ I knew it! It suits you well- Well, what I meant was, a lot of Wagner's music is about sex.”

“That’s absolutely debatable.“

“It really isn’t? Wahaha~ Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde is just a big climax?”

“I am sure that snickering children like you wouldn’t be able to grasp it, but it’s not necessarily a climax of the sexual kind .”

“It is, though? It's not like it’s a controversial subject when people discuss Wagner. Like sure, one thing can have multiple meanings, yeah, birds fly and eat, trees grow and die, and we make art that means all kinds of things. But yeah. It’s a sexual aria.” 

Shu scoffed.

“Liebestod literally means _love death,_ don’t you know? In the context of the opera, it’s Isolde’s last breath of absolute heartbreak while holding her lover's dead body, and the music goes on to tease again and again a buildup for the beginning of a revelation of absolute sublimity, until she transcends beautifully as she passes away in grief and love. To reduce Wagner's work to something as base as- “

“Well, the melody is still about sex.”

“NOW, LISTEN, YOU LITTLE- “

Shu stood up from his table.

“Wahahahahaha~ Inspiration comes from absolutely all places, you know! Are y'really mad for real?”

In passing, he looked down at the costume he was making. He was putting a lot of passion in it, from conception to each button, and that was all very much real, wasn't it? 

“Anyway, it's not like Shu never did it, right?”

He was at once taken by the urge to violently rip each of that _thing’_ s papers, one by one.

“Get out. GET _OUT_! I will absolutely not have it! Get out of here, at once!”

“Oh, hey, sorry, sorry! I shouldn’t have assumed- That was rude of me, wasn’t it? That was super rude of me! Hey, Shu, back then I just thought that you and Nazu …”

“GET OUT! _NOW_!”

Tsukinaga gathered his papers in a hurry and stood up.

“Sorry, sorry, ok!”

“To even IMPLY that I would soil Nito like that!!!! “

“Hey, stop saying it as if it was that dirty!!”

“Well, what would someone like _you_ even know about it?!! Have _you_ engaged in such a thing?!“

“I am a knight, you know, it wouldn’t be dignified to kiss and tell.”

Tsukinaga's dumb smile was the final drop.

In a half second, he realized that Tsukinaga had, indeed, had intercourse. And that meant that Tsukinaga had access to an entire range of references of passionate feelings and realities for his art that shu didn’t have the first clue about, didn’t have the slightest real understanding of, besides horrible, shameful thoughts on his own, and the thought of that just -

When Shu opened his eyes, after blinking, he realized that, in anger, he had pushed Tsukinaga against the wall.

“It was you and Sena, wasn’t it?? "

Tsukinaga blinked twice, in confusion, and then smiled somehow wickedly.

“Shu seems really interested in my sex life, huh?”

Before he could open his mouth to swear in French, Tsukinaga continued, speaking in a frenzy.

“Y’know, I just assumed that you and Nazu were just like us, huh, I guess it's why I said it. But me and Sena were me and Sena, and you and Nazu are you and Nazu, and well, everyone in this world is their own person. Hey, you don’t need sex, don’t worry about it. Inspiration is everywhere, just pick whatever you want anywhere you want, a good artist like you must know that, right? Wahaha!~ But hey-" He winked " You do love him, don’t you? I can understand that. The pain of love is an inspiration as good as any, _as good as any_!”

His eyes were shining in a way that, for some reason, made Shu feel an unsettling shiver through his spine. 

“Not for me though, not for me! Shu’s music is always filled with pain, isn’t it? Well, not me anymore, no, since I came back I'll write happy songs only, It's what I swore. Before, I thought that pain could only bring more inspiration, but well, who needs that? Sena didn’t like my sad songs back then, no one did. But _Shu_ can write a masterpiece about lost love, I can feel it!! Show me your masterpiece, Shu!! Even though you could just go to Nazu and tell him you want his love…Well, didn't he give you everything he had back then? That's the impression I had. Didn’t he live for you and your art, then? Well, go and tell him again about your feelings, don’t be dumb. But _Shu_ , Shu can write a masterpiece about painful love, I am sure! And I’d love to see it, I'd love to see it! You have everything you need for that!"

His smile widened.

"But not me, not me. Well, Sena is knitting scarves and collecting gravures and cut down pictures from magazines of Yuukun, but that is fine by me, it's fine by me! Sena is taking his time healing in his own way, you see- It's easier for him to do that than say it to me ~that is fine by me, It's fine by me, there is no hurry at all - And you, Shu, well, _Shu_ can put in his painful love even in the beautiful outfits he sews. So I am ready to see your next masterpiece, Shu!”

"... Are you out of your mind??? What are you going on about? Someone like you has absolutely no right to even BEGIN to speak about Nito. This is preposterous, ridiculous, asinine-"

“Ah, was I being unfair? Yeah, I was being cruel to Shu, wasn’t I?” He still smiled “Do you want a formal apology? “

He didn’t remember when they got that close. Shu could see his dumb freckles.

“Say what you will but do NOT mock me when it comes to art, I shall not have it.”

“Huh? I am serious , though. I want to see Shu's masterpieces and get all mad like, damn, you really got me this time, what a genius!”

He sounded sincere enough in that.

“Hmph. I shouldn’t have let you in the room at all. You are hopeless. But it's no wonder… My art might not be for the common pig, but even someone like you should be able to acknowledge it…So you want to see my next masterpiece? “

“Yeah.“

Tsukinaga dropped the vicious smile he had on before, and something in his eyes seemed very lonely, for a second. Shu hated it. It made him feel a bit of the same, and he couldn’t afford to make that kind of expression. He hated it, absolutely hated it.

Then before he knew it, Tsukinaga kissed him on the lips, once, in a way Shu barely felt it, and afterwards just looked at him curiously as if Shu was the most intriguing creature in the planet.

“Shu is all red.”

“W-“

“You are the one who pinned me to a wall...”

Tsukinaga stood on his tiptoes and kissed him again, for some seconds longer this time, before going back to looking silently.

“What are you doing this for?…How unsightly.”

“I’d say that I…Just do the things I do. And what I don’t do I don’t.”

Shu had no idea why he was not screaming for him to leave again. He felt stunned and his head hurt horribly.

"I thought it’d be a really terrible idea if I did kiss you” Tsukinaga continued. “It’d be a really terrible idea wouldn’t it? “ He chuckled and grinned, but his eyes were still so _sad_. …Was he making a similar expression? That’d be utterly unacceptable, it’d be simply- simply-

Groaning in frustration, Shu pressed him further against the wall, but freezed the second before their lips met. Tsukinaga closed the distance, and he was relieved that they’d both close their eyes.

Kissing was as disgusting as he thought it would be. Well, was that what all the centuries of beautiful art was about? Slippery lips and exchange of saliva? No, that couldn’t be quite it. Shu Itsuki didn’t stop at something until he excelled at it, he would show him…He would _show_ him…

Tsukinaga had his hands in his hair and neck. He wasn’t _As_ short as Nito, but…

No. He wouldn’t think of Nito.

That thought coupled with the thought of Tsukinaga messing up his hair suddenly brought him a big flash of unadulterated rage, and he grabbed both of his wrists and also pressed them against the wall. Shu didn’t open his eyes to see if he was surprised, but heard him snicker, and the next thing he knew he felt Tsukinaga bite his lower lip.

“NON. DO NOT BITE ME.”

“...Are you S _ure_?” 

Was he sure? 

Instead of replying he went back to kissing. If kissing was meant to invoke passionate feelings, it definitely was working. He felt endless passionate burning anger, towards not only Tsukinaga, but absolutely everything that ever existed in the world. He cursed Wagner, and he cursed the couple that were debasing themselves in the archery field, and he cursed Tsukinaga's whine that escaped his mouth, and he cursed himself the most, when Tsukinaga, who he thought would stop moving when he had his wrists pinned, suddenly moved his leg between his legs, and he gasped.

They looked at eachother again for a second, and Shu said nothing when Tsukinaga went down on his knees.

-

The sound of the sewing machine was back, as Shu looked closely and carefully at the threads in the cloth.

He could hear the sound of Tsukinaga's humming and frantic paper writing. What time even was it? 2 am? 3 am? He was back at concentrating at work for what felt like a big infinite blur of time, and didn’t want to take his eyes off the cloth to look at the clock. 

Again, he stopped the sewing machine to adjust something manually, taking hold of his needle. 

Tsukinaga’s humming melody was good. Haunting. The kind that could stick to his head. Nothing he couldn’t beat, though. He certainly would. For a second, that distracted him enough to glance his way. Lying down on the floor amidst his papers, completely absorbed in his writing, his orange hair a complete mess.

“OUCH.”

That was his own voice, and he looked back in his hands. Somehow he had accidentally pricked his finger, and a small red spot stared back at him.

“Hey Shu are y’ok?”

“Yes. Everything is perfectly acceptable.”

As long as he’d focus on this.

“I see, I see! Hey Shu…I really did mean it, y’ know. I am looking forward for your next big piece.”

“I could say the same about yours, Tsukinaga.”

It was four am. They both went back to focusing on their work.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> imagine how awkward it'd be for Shu next time he runs into Izumi in this universe
> 
> anyway THANKS 4 READING : ) 
> 
> [im here on twitter where i post art and say dumb shit !](https://twitter.com/mayalla17)
> 
> [ and heres my frend who inspired me asdasdasdasd](https://twitter.com/moonlitfragment)
> 
> thanks again 4 reading this it was fun to write


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